Empress of All Seasons

by Emiko Jean

  Taro’s swords scraped the ground. “I can’t do that.”

  Mari blinked, and in that moment, she released any dream of a life with Taro. It flew away like a wild bird into the night. Perhaps it wouldn’t matter, his half brother’s betrayal. She couldn’t trust him again. Not with so many lives at stake. Not with so much between them. “Then I cannot surrender,” she whispered.

  Taro grimaced.

  Blood rushed through Mari’s veins as she lifted the naginata. She crouched and swung out with the pole end, clipping Taro behind the knees. The move never let her down. Taro buckled, but, using his bent knees as a springboard, he somersaulted backwards into the air. He landed with an oomph, swords drawn. He rushed her.

  They were back in the Spring Room, wielding their weapons against each other in an intricate dance. But this time no courtiers watched; no cherry blossoms lined the ring. This time there was the crackle of fire, the stench of burning bodies, the cry of falling Animal Wives. Violence. Destruction. War.

  Mari blocked Taro’s sword with the pole end of the naginata. She began to twist the weapon, but the movement was halted as a sudden pain radiated down her side. Taro’s mouth fell open and he stumbled back, his short sword covered in blood. Her blood. Mari touched her side. A nasty gash ran the length of her torso. Not a killing wound, but enough to make her bend over and gasp. Cripple her.

  Taro’s swords clattered to the ground. “Mari?” He caught her by the arms, steadying her. Their eyes locked. For a moment, the melee muted. It felt as if everything were beginning and ending at the same time. His face spelled a lifetime of regret, of hurt, of sadness.

  Blood coated Mari’s fingers, and she grasped at Taro. Her ears began to ring. “Look what we’ve done to each other.” I could have loved you. I could have been your Empress of All Seasons. We could have found another way.

  A glint of metal flashed in Mari’s vision. A throwing star sliced through the air. Mari cried out. With her last bit of strength, she pivoted her body in front of Taro, and the throwing star sliced across her belly. A killing blow. Mari crumpled in Taro’s arms.

  She grazed his stubbled cheek with her fingers. “Don’t take me from here,” she pleaded. Don’t take me from my home. Taro’s mouth quaked. “I didn’t kill your father. The traitor is in your own house, in your own bloodline.” She gasped. Her final words were spent warning Taro, trying to save the man she truly loved.

  The whites of Taro’s eyes turned red and watery. “Satoshi?”

  Her eyes fluttered shut. She shuddered. An empress. Beloved by the Seasons. Chosen by gods and goddesses. Gone.

  Chapter 54

  Akira

  A sob lodged in Akira’s throat as he watched Mari fall. Tears marred his vision.

  Heat blazed around Akira’s ankles. The forest was burning. Let it burn. Let me burn along with it. He had killed his beloved. No. No. No. None of this could be real.

  “Son of Nightmares!” the emperor boomed. Akira saw him through the trees. The emperor stood just above the smoke line, swords in hand. “Come and face me!” he screamed.

  A shriek bent the air. Akira looked up. An Animal Wife circled above, swooped down, slashing at Taro’s guard. Mari’s mother. The other Animal Wives followed, swarming the samurai.

  In the chaos, only Akira saw the knife fly through the air. He recognized the cut of the blade. It was the same knife Satoshi had used to kill Mari’s servant. It sliced through Taro’s armor and landed with a thunk in his chest. The prince staggered back. He dropped his swords, hands going to the hilt of the knife. Taro crumpled to his knees, inches from Mari’s slain body. Blood seeped through his armor. The Animal Wives noticed the crippled prince and drew back, circling above.

  They waited.

  They watched.

  The samurai dropped to their knees beside their fallen emperor. Ninja climbed down trees and alighted from the forest. They put their hands over their hearts. Taro’s mouth opened and closed. He tried to speak, but no words formed. With the last of his strength, he crawled to Mari. Carefully, he pulled her into his arms. A boom of thunder rocked the mountain. Then he was gone.

  Silence descended, eerie and heavy. The samurai and ninja had been trained to follow. What would they do without their leader?

  Satoshi stumbled from the forest.

  No. Akira reached for the star at his belt. Empty. He’d used the last one on the emperor—no—on Mari. Cruel fate.

  A samurai stood. “The emperor is dead.”

  Sensing a new threat, the Animal Wives shrieked and dove toward Satoshi. A deep breath, and the priest began to chant. Burnt cinnamon suffused the air, turning to acrid smoke. The priest’s words started low but grew in volume. The wind ruffled his robes as he reached to the sky. Akira felt the magic enter him, a burning tether that wrapped loosely around his soul. He could withstand it. The Animal Wives could not. Their bodies transformed in the air and dropped from the sky. It was a terrible sight. Samurai jumped back as Animal Wives landed, heaps of dust and broken bones. Preternaturally beautiful women littered the dirt road.

  Between chants, Satoshi barked orders. He turned to a samurai with a red tassel on his helmet. “Search the woods. Find all yōkai and collar them.” The samurai hesitated. “Go!” Satoshi cried. “The emperor is dead. I am next in line. Heed me now, or turn against your empire.”

  Satoshi continued his incantations, sweating with the exertion. Mari lay near the priest’s feet. Akira’s eyes drew to her small, lifeless form. She looked so young, so vulnerable. So small in the fallen emperor’s arms.

  Samurai began to comb through the Animal Wives, collaring survivors. A group split off into the forest. Akira scurried up a cypress tree. He pressed his body against the trunk and watched over Mari through the branches. It was all he could do. Tears rushed down his face like hot waterfalls. It was the end for their people. And it was his fault. He’d killed his Animal Girl.

  Suddenly, he remembered Hanako and Ren. They were still in the forest. His friends. He could do no more for Mari. Even now, a limping samurai was picking up her body. “Build a pyre, burn the bodies, and stay there until they turn to ash.” Satoshi shuddered with rage.

  Akira was jumping from tree to tree when he saw Hanako and Ren. They were alive but incapacitated, the priest’s chants filtering on the wind.

  Akira dropped from the trees. “We have to get you out of here,” he said to them, although he wasn’t sure they could hear him through their pain. “Samurai are razing the woods.”

  Hanako moaned. Ren shuddered.

  “Mari?” Hanako groaned.

  Akira shook his head, tears lighting his eyes. He couldn’t bring himself to say it. She’s gone, and by my hand. He crouched and helped Ren up. He looped an arm around the giant but couldn’t stand with his weight. The demon slumped back to the ground. “I won’t leave you behind.” He tried again. No use. He sat next to the demon, panting and out of breath.

  Hanako whimpered, and her lips parted. “H-h” was all she could get out.

  “What is it?” Akira asked.

  Hanako tried again. “H-hide.”

  “Hide?” Akira repeated. He jumped up.

  Akira rolled Ren’s body deep into the forest just as the first streaks of sunlight dawned. Then he carried Hanako. He laid the Snow Girl and the oni next to each other, covering them with branches and leaves. Then he climbed high in a tree just before the samurai arrived, trampling the forest.

  The group fanned out, jabbing at the ground with their spears. Akira held his breath. One. Two. Three. Four. Five . . . Akira counted the seconds until the samurai left. He waited. Silent as the wind. He counted.

  The sun rose and set. Flies buzzed and bit Akira’s cheeks. The priest’s chants finally halted. Below, the leaves rustled; Hanako and Ren woke from their pain-filled stupors, but they stayed put, sensing Akira’s directive.

  Wait. Wait. Wait.

  Finally, the dawn came. A squirrel scampered in the branches overhead. Slowly, Akira climbed
to the top of the tree. Smoke nearly covered the sun, but he could see that the army was still there, picking through the ruins of Tsuma. Everything was gone. Mari’s home. It was obliterated. A wasteland.

  All that was left of the village was smoke-charred ruins and a rusted iron gate. He scanned the road. Burnt bodies and tents. A handful of samurai had been left behind to raid the village. But there was no evidence of Satoshi, the new emperor. The trees nearest the road had darkened to crimson, transformed to jubokko, blood-vampire trees, common on the battlefield.

  Akira felt something shift within him. Mari was dead, but her cause was not. Thousands of yōkai still wore collars. Akira would not rest until each one was destroyed. Every yōkai freed.

  Chapter 55

  Mari

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  Her nose twitched. The air was musty and dank. For one sweet second, she remained floating in the in-between. Then pain lanced her side and stomach, and she gasped. Her eyelids fluttered. Wooden walls. An oil lamp. The smell of rapeseed. She knew this room. The killing shed. The place where everything had started. And everything ended.

  Drip. Drip. Drip.

  “I think she’s waking up.” The voice was familiar.

  “Give her some breathing room.” Another voice, less friendly.

  Memories gushed forth as a clock rewinding—the slice of the throwing star, a time of love and competition to the death, a journey along a dirt road, rōnin . . . Masa. Hiro, red smoke. She tried to shift, but her body wouldn’t work from the neck down.

  “Don’t move.” Masa wrung out a washcloth over a bowl. Drip. Drip. Drip. He swiped the cloth over her brow. The cold felt good against her throbbing head. “We weren’t sure you were going to make it. Hiro noticed your fingers move.” Masa smiled warmly.

  “Hiro,” she whispered.

  The samurai moved into her line of sight. He frowned. Of course. “This shed was the only place I could think to hide you,” he said.

  Mari winced as pain shot up her side.

  “I’ve stitched you up, and the bleeding has stopped. You’ve slept through the worst part. And I’ve ensured that there will be no fever,” Hiro said, and held up a bowl with a thick paste that smelled of pine and cucumber.

  “Night flower,” she murmured.

  “You’ll heal, but you’ll be changed,” Hiro said.

  Masa flexed his injured arm and winked. “Aches at the end of every day. What is broken can never fully be put back together.” Masa paused. “We’re sorry we didn’t come earlier. We were halfway down the mountain when we saw the smoke. But better late than never.”

  Mari nodded, and tears leaked from her eyes. She had so many questions—about her friends, her sisters, her mother, Taro. Who had lived and who had died? But she didn’t know if she was ready for the answers. If she didn’t know who perished, they would stay alive in her mind a little longer.

  “Thank you,” she said, feeling the dark tide of sleep pull her under.

  Hiro nodded. “I’ve honored my debt to you. A life for a life.”

  “A life for a life.” Mari drifted off with a smile on her face.

  * * *

  She dreamed of wolves.

  Her mother did love to hunt the canines. When Mari was young, Tami took her hunting. It was the first time she’d seen her mother transform. Black scales against white snow. Her mother tracked a gray male to its den. There were no cubs. Just the male and its female, a smaller wolf with black triangle ears and paws. Tami had pinned the male and swiftly cut its throat so it wouldn’t suffer. Then she shifted back to her human form, her skin absorbing the afternoon light. Together they carried the wolf back to Tsuma to share the meat with the clan.

  That night, the female wolf came to the village. She’d tracked them all the way home. She clawed at porches and ripped plants from gardens.

  Yuka killed the wolf.

  Tami shook her head. “Such a shame. Some females don’t know when to quit; they’ll do anything for a male.”

  Mari had watched Yuka skin the wolf, a heavy feeling in her chest. Her eyes grew hot and gummy. She didn’t think it was a shame. Mari thought sacrifice was the ultimate act of love.

  The dream morphed into a black cave with echoing voices.

  Men are conditioned to take. Women are conditioned to give. Her mother.

  We’re all monsters. No man, no human, will ever love us. That is the curse of the Animal Wife, never to be loved for who we truly are. Hissa.

  I think we ought to be friends. I think it’s the best idea I’ve ever had. Akira.

  I believe in us, in what we can do together. Taro.

  Mari woke with a gasp. “Are you in pain?” Masa hovered.

  “My mother, my village, I need to see,” she said. She fumbled with her covers, struggled to stand. But her body was too weak. She tried to call her beast forward, but it was injured too. It had fallen into a healing sleep.

  “Easy, now,” Masa crooned. “No need to tear your stitches. I’ll take you.” Masa tried to scoop her up but winced in pain. “My arm,” he said, setting her back down. “I can barely lift a sword nowadays.”

  Mari squeezed her eyes shut. Helpless and alone. But then she felt herself being jostled. A gentle, strong arm hooked under her legs and around her shoulders. She opened her eyes and saw Hiro. Still sullen. Still frowning. Hiro doesn’t like anyone. He has two expressions: angry and less angry. “Is this your angry or less angry face?” Mari grimaced as pain radiated up her side.

  Hiro held her gaze. “You should not be going out. You need at least a month of bed rest.”

  Masa opened the door to the shed, and Mari squinted against the searing afternoon light. Fresh air stung her lungs.

  “That way.” Mari pointed to a path obscured by low-hanging branches. “It’s a shortcut I used to take.”

  As they walked, Masa stayed in front, holding back branches, widening the path for Hiro and his precious cargo.

  “I always wondered . . . Why did you do it?” Hiro asked.

  “Why did I do what?” Mari bit out through the pain.

  “In the shed.”

  Mari tried to look Hiro in the eye, but she couldn’t move. “I am not beautiful. It was believed I would never be a true Animal Wife. My mother decided to train me for the competition. So I could at least become Empress, and an Animal Wife in my own way,” Mari said. At the mention of her mother, she felt a sudden weakness.

  Hiro grew silent, taciturn. The trees began to change, their trunks charred and black, their leaves gone. The scent of smoke clung to the air.

  Mari thought of the battle, of Taro. There had always been inequalities in their relationship. Taro was human. Mari was yōkai. But more than that, it seemed Mari was always the one sacrificing. She’d faced death again and again. She had lost her ally, her friend Asami. All for Taro. And for another way. She’d been willing to change to fit in Taro’s world with the hopes of transforming it. But now she realized she didn’t need to change. The world did.

  A muscle rippled in Hiro’s jaw, and he spoke as if unable to keep his thoughts quiet. “They don’t get to decide that,” he said.

  “What? Who?” Mari asked. They’d come to the end of the path. Tsuma’s gate squeaked in the wind.

  “The Animal Wives, anyone. They don’t get to decide whether you’re beautiful or not,” Hiro said.

  “Who does, then?” Mari asked.

  Hiro looked down at Mari. “You, I suppose.”

  Mari had always known there was power in words. And Hiro’s words struck her as revolutionary, even if she already had discovered their meaning for herself. I am the only person who decides if I am beautiful or not, if I am worthy or unworthy.

  Masa stopped abruptly. So did Hiro. “Samurai,” Masa whispered.

  They peered through a thick row of branches. Tsuma was in ruins. The streets were scorched black, the cottages burnt skeletons, some still smoldering. Only the gate and the rock wall remained. Ashes fluttered on the wind. Figures unfurled fr
om the steaming wreckage. Samurai in black lacquered armor were raiding the Animal Wives’ stores.

  Hiro stepped back, and a pinecone crunched under his heel. The sound echoed. The samurai paused and turned.

  “Who goes there?” A samurai with a red tassel on his helmet moved forward.

  Mari’s whole body began to tremble. Hiro tightened his hold on her. He turned to run.

  “Halt.” Out of the corner of her eye, Mari saw the glint of a spear positioned at the back of Hiro’s neck. More samurai broke through the trees. They were surrounded. Had she lived only to die here, amid the ruins of her village?

  The samurai with the red tassel lowered his spear, then ripped the mask from his face. “Gods and goddesses, it’s the empress!” he yelled.

  The rest of the samurai removed their masks as well, eyes wide and unbelieving. “She lives,” one said.

  Mari held her breath. Masa’s hands hovered over his swords. Mari counted more than twenty samurai. Her hands curled into fists, talons sprouting from her fingertips. The beast was injured, but it gave her what it could. They were outnumbered, and she was in no condition to fight. Weak or not, she’d try to claw her way out of this. She’d never give up.

  Hiro adjusted his hold on her. “Do you think you can stand?” he murmured in her ear.

  No. Even in the rōnin’s arms, her legs felt watery, useless. “If I cannot stand, I will fight lying down.” This earned her a rare smile from the rōnin.

  The samurai’s expressions were as severe and forbidding as blocks of ice. They stepped closer. Hiro’s grip on Mari tightened. In unison, the samurai placed their hands to their hearts and dropped to their knees, eyes shining with transparent emotion. “The emperor is dead,” the leader spoke. At this, Mari’s heart twisted in her chest. A choked sob escaped her as the memory came. The battlefield. Her bleeding out. Arms wrapping around her. Then a body going still. Had that been Taro? Had he, in the final moments of life, reached for her? Something in Mari constricted with certainty. Yes. Taro had chosen her in his last breath.